There are a variety of emulsions, suspensions, pastes and high viscosity liquids used in the manufacture or which become part of the variety of products in the chemical, pharmaceutical, food products, and photographic industries. These emulsions, suspensions, pastes and high viscosity liquids often contain air or gases which are dissolved therein or are present in the form of small bubbles. Often this air or gas, particularly in the case of entrained bubbles, is detrimental to the final product being produced. For example, in the case of photographic emulsions, the gas bubbles greatly impair the quality of the films or photographic papers produced with these emulsions because the bubbles disturb the evenness of volumetric flow of the emulsion as it is applied by the coating devices. This gives rise to the formation of streaks and spots making the photographic materials unusable.
An apparatus which is typically used in the photographic industry for debubbling photographic emulsions is an end cap round ultrasonic bubble eliminator, typically referred to as an ECR. The ECR includes a transducer horn assembly (hereinafter referred to as a "THA") which is an electromechanical device which converts electrical vibration to mechanical vibration. One particular ECR with its component THA is taught in U.S. Pat. No. 5,373,212 to Beau. In the operation of an ECR, an alternating voltage is applied to the ceramic disk of the THA which, as a result, generates mechanical vibration. This mechanical vibration results in the debubbling of the photographic emulsions flowing through the ECR.
The effectiveness and efficiency of an ECR THA in the performance of debubbling operations can be critical to whether or not an acceptable final product is produced. In the past there has been no practical method for testing the effectiveness and efficiency of an ECR THA and, therefore, an ECR THA which was no longer performing adequately was not replaced or repaired until it had resulted in the production of product which was out of specification or otherwise not useful. As a result, a means of testing the effectiveness and efficiency of the ECR THA was needed. Preferably, testing of the ECR THA could be performed on-line.